NATIONAL COLLEGE OF BUSINESS AND ARTS

MASTER IN BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION

Aurora Boulevard, Cubao, Quezon City • Telephone Nos. 8913-8785 to 87

Name: Gulfo, Pamela Ann B. Subject: MBA SM 6:00PM-9:30PM

Student Number: 2021-30393 Professor: Dr. Marcial V. Mojica
Topic: Strategy Implementation: Organizing for Action

I. WHAT IS STRATEGY IMPLEMENTATION?

Strategy implementation: Organizing for action

Strategy implementation is the sum total of the activities and choices required for the
execution of strategic plan by which strategies and policies are put into action through the
development of programs, budgets and procedures. Although implementation is usually
considered after strategy has been formulated, implementation is a key part of strategic
management. Thus, strategy formulation and strategy implementation are the two sides of
same coin.

II. 7 KEY STEPS IN THE IMPLEMENTATION PROCESS

If you're relatively new to management, you might be wondering what the term “strategy
implementation” means.

Strategy implementation is the process of turning plans into action to reach a desired
outcome. Essentially, it’s the art of getting stuff done. The success of every organization
 NATIONAL COLLEGE OF BUSINESS AND ARTS
MASTER IN BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
Aurora Boulevard, Cubao, Quezon City • Telephone Nos. 8913-8785 to 87

rests on its capacity to implement decisions and execute key processes efficiently,
effectively, and consistently. But how do you ensure that implementing a strategy will be
successful?

In the online course Management Essentials, Harvard Business School Professor David
Garvin says successfully implementing and executing strategy involves “delivering what’s
planned or promised on time, on budget, at quality, and with minimum variability—even in
the face of unexpected events and contingencies."

While developing a strategy is one of the first steps to implementing organizational change,
the implementation itself is vital to a company’s success. Without an efficient implementation
process, even the best-laid plans may not come to fruition.

If you're a manager who wants to implement strategic change within your organization,
follow these seven steps to introduce and roll out a new strategy successfully.

1. Set Clear Goals and Define Key Variables

The first step of the process is straightforward: You must identify the goals that the new
strategy should achieve. Without a clear picture of what you’re trying to attain, it can be
difficult to establish a plan for getting there.

One common mistake when goal setting—whether related to personal growth, professional
development, or business—is setting objectives that are impossible to reach. Remember:
Goals should be attainable. Setting goals that aren’t realistic can lead you and your team to
feel overwhelmed, uninspired, deflated, and potentially burnt out.

To avoid inadvertently causing low morale, review the outcomes and performances—both
the successes and failures—of previous change initiatives to determine what’s realistic given
your timeframe and resources. Use this past experience to define what success looks like.

Another important aspect of goal setting is to account for variables that may hinder your
team’s ability to reach them and to lay out contingency plans. The better prepared you are,
the more successful the implementation will likely be.

2. Determine Roles, Responsibilities, and Relationships

Once you’ve determined the goals you’re working toward and the variables that might get in
your way, you should build a roadmap for achieving those goals, set expectations among
your team, and clearly communicate your implementation plan, so there’s no confusion.

In this phase, it can be helpful to document all of the resources available, including the
employees, teams, and departments that will be involved. Outline a clear picture of what
each resource is responsible for achieving, and establish a communication process that
everyone should adhere to.
 NATIONAL COLLEGE OF BUSINESS AND ARTS
MASTER IN BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
Aurora Boulevard, Cubao, Quezon City • Telephone Nos. 8913-8785 to 87

Implementing strategic plans requires strong relationships and, as a manager, you’ll be in

charge of telling people not only how to interact with each other and how often, but also who
the decision-makers are, who’s accountable for what, and what to do when an unforeseen
issue arises.

3. Delegate the Work

Once you know what needs to be done to ensure success, determine who needs to do what
and when. Refer to your original timeline and goal list, and delegate tasks to the appropriate
team members.

You should explain the big picture to your team so they understand the company's vision
and make sure everyone knows their specific responsibilities. Also, set deadlines to avoid
overwhelming individuals. Remember that your job as a manager is to achieve goals and
keep your team on-task, so try to avoid the urge to micromanage.

4. Execute the Plan, Monitor Progress and Performance, and Provide Continued
Support

Next, you’ll need to put the plan into action. One of the most difficult skills to learn as a
manager is how to guide and support employees effectively. While your focus will likely be
on delegation much of the time, it’s important to make yourself available to answer questions
your employees might have, or address challenges and roadblocks they may be
experiencing.

Check in with your team regularly about their progress and listen to their feedback.

One effective strategy for monitoring progress is to use daily, weekly, and monthly status
reports and check-ins to provide updates, re-establish due dates and milestones, and
ensure all teams are aligned.

5. Take Corrective Action (Adjust or Revise, as Necessary)

Implementation is an iterative process, so the work doesn’t stop as soon as you think you’ve
reached your goal. Processes can change mid-course, and unforeseen issues or challenges
can arise. Sometimes, your original goals will need to shift as the nature of the project itself
changes.

It’s more important to be attentive, flexible, and willing to change or readjust plans as you
oversee implementation than it is to blindly adhere to your original goals.

Periodically ask yourself and your team: Do we need to adjust? If so, how? Do we need to
start over? The answers to these questions can prove invaluable.

6. Get Closure on the Project, and Agreement on the Output

 NATIONAL COLLEGE OF BUSINESS AND ARTS
MASTER IN BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
Aurora Boulevard, Cubao, Quezon City • Telephone Nos. 8913-8785 to 87

Everyone on the team should agree on what the final product should look like based on the
goals set at the beginning. When you’ve successfully implemented your strategy, check in
with each team member and department to make sure they have everything they need to
finish the job and feel like their work is complete.

You’ll need to report to your management team, so gather information, details, and results
from your employees, so that you can paint an accurate picture to leadership.

7. Conduct a Retrospective or Review of How the Process Went

Once your strategy has been fully implemented, look back on the process and evaluate how
things went. Ask yourself questions like:

• Did we achieve our goals?

• If not, why? What steps are required to get us to those goals?
• What roadblocks or challenges emerged over the course of the project that could
have been anticipated? How can we avoid these challenges in the future?
• In general, what lessons can we learn from the process?

While failure is never the goal, an unsuccessful or flawed strategy implementation can prove
a valuable learning experience for an organization, so long as time is taken to understand
what went wrong and why.

III. DEVELOPING PROGRAMS, BUDGETS AND PROCEDURES

Bamford et. al (2018) stated that strategy implementation involves establishing programs
and tactics to create a series of organizational activities, budgets to allocate funds for the
initiated activities, and procedures to monitor and control the progress of the activities as
follows:

• Programs. The purpose of a program or a tactic is to make a strategy action-oriented. In

practice, a program is a collection of tactics, and a tactic is the individual action taken by the
organization as an element of the effort to accomplish a plan. For example, when Xerox
Corporation undertook a turnaround strategy, it needed to significantly reduce its costs and
expenses. Management introduced Lean Six Sigma. This program was developed to identify
and improve a poorly performing process. Xerox first trained its top executives in the
program and then launched around 250 individual Six Sigma projects throughout the
corporation. The result was US$6 million or 300 million pesos in savings in one year.

The following are the different types of offensive tactics:

1. Frontal assault. It involves matching the competitor in every business category from
price to promotion and distribution channel. To be successful, the attacker must have
not only superior resources, but also the willingness to persevere. This is generally a
costly tactic and may serve to awaken a sleeping giant of depressing profits for the
whole industry.
 NATIONAL COLLEGE OF BUSINESS AND ARTS
MASTER IN BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
Aurora Boulevard, Cubao, Quezon City • Telephone Nos. 8913-8785 to 87

EXAMPLE: This is what Kimberly-Clark did when it introduced Huggies disposable

diapers against P&G’s market-leading Pampers. The resulting competitive battle
between the two (2) firms depressed Kimberly-Clark’s profits.

2. Flanking maneuver. It involves attacking a part of the market where the competitor
is weak.

EXAMPLE: Texas Instruments avoided competing directly with Intel by developing

microprocessors for consumer electronics, cell phones, and medical devices instead
of computers. Taken together, these other applications are more profitable and
influential than the computers, which Intel dominates.

3. Bypass attack. It involves cutting the market out from under the established defender
by offering a new type of product that makes the competitor’s product unnecessary.

EXAMPLE: Instead of competing directly against Microsoft’s Pocket PC and Palm

Pilot for the handheld computer market, Apple introduced the iPod as a personal
digital music player. It was the most radical change to the way people listen to music
since the Sony Walkman. By redefining the market, Apple successfully sidestepped
both Intel and Microsoft, leaving them to play “catch-up”.

4. Encirclement. It occurs when an attacking company or unit encircles the competitor’s

position in terms of products or markets. The “encircler” is known to have a greater
product variety and/or serves more markets.

EXAMPLE: Steinway was a major manufacturer of pianos in the United States until
Yamaha entered the market with a broader range of pianos, keyboards, and other
musical instruments. The company was taken private in 2013 and focused almost
exclusively on the very high end of the market, producing their 600,000th piano in
2015.

5. Guerrilla warfare. It is characterized by the use of small, intermittent assaults on

different market segments held by the competitor. In this way, a new entrant or small
firm can make some gains without seriously threatening a large, established
competitor and evoking some form of retaliation. To be successful, the firm or unit
conducting guerrilla warfare must be patient enough to accept small gains and avoid
pushing the established competitor to the point that it must respond or else lose face.
EXAMPLE: Microbreweries, which make beer for sale to local customers, use this
tactic against major brewers in the industry.

The following are the different types of defensive tactics:

1. Raise structural barriers. It involves blocking a challenger’s logical avenues of

attack by offering a full line of products in every market segment, raising switching
costs, gaining exclusive agreements, and reducing product and services cost.

EXAMPLE: Coca-Cola offers unprofitable non-carbonated beverages to block

competitors’ entry point in non-carbonated products.
 NATIONAL COLLEGE OF BUSINESS AND ARTS
MASTER IN BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
Aurora Boulevard, Cubao, Quezon City • Telephone Nos. 8913-8785 to 87

2. Increase expected retaliation. It involves increasing the perceived threat of

counterattack. For instance, management may strongly defend any erosion of market
share by drastically cutting prices or matching a challenger’s promotion through a
policy of accepting any price-reduction coupons for a competitor’s product. This
counterattack is especially important in markets that are very important to the
defending company or business unit.

EXAMPLE: When Clorox Company challenged P&G in the detergent market with
Clorox Super Detergent, P&G retaliated by test marketing its liquid bleach of the time,
Lemon Fresh Comet, in an attempt to scare Clorox into retreating from the detergent
market.

3. Lower the inducement for attack. It involves reducing a challenger’s expectations

of future profits in the industry.

EXAMPLE: Southwest Airlines can deliberately keep prices low and continuously
invest in cost-reducing measures. With prices kept very low, there is little profit
incentive for a new entrant.

• Budgets. It is way for a corporation to check the feasibility of its selected strategy by
identifying the significant cost which will be incurred during strategy implementation. An ideal
strategy might be found to be completely impractical only after specific implementation
programs and tactics are costed in detail. Mondelez is the world’s largest buyer of cocoa
and in 2012 committed to dramatically increase the supply of sustainably grown cocoa in
the six (6) big cocoa producing countries. The company budgeted US$400 million or 20
billion pesos to reach over 200,000 cocoa farmers by 2022.

• Procedures. These are often called Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), which
typically detail the various activities that must be carried out to complete a corporation’s
programs and tactical plans. Once in place, procedures must be updated to reflect any
changes in technology as well as in strategy. For example, a company following a
differentiation competitive strategy manages its sales force more closely than does a firm
following a low-cost strategy. Differentiation requires long-term customer relationships
created out of close interaction with the sales force. An in-depth understanding of the
customer’s needs provides the foundation for product development and improvement.

References:

https://www.brainkart.com/article/Strategy-implementation--Organizing-for-action_7099/

https://online.hbs.edu/blog/post/strategy-implementation-for-managers

https://www.toppers4u.com/2020/12/strategic-management-features.html

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/synergy